The Samajwadi Party (SP), taking the lead over all others towards 2014 Lok Sabha elections, declared its first list of candidates for Uttar Pradesh in Lucknow on Friday.

The Samajwadi Party (SP), taking the lead over all others towards 2014 Lok Sabha elections, declared its first list of candidates for Uttar Pradesh in Lucknow on Friday. The first list declared by the national general secretary, Ramgopal Yadav has 55 candidates of which 18 are sitting MPs. With this it also becomes official that one more Yadav family member enters politics as Ramgopal Yadav declared his son Akshya Yadav as the candidate for the Firozabad seat.

“It is always a wise to be prepared for any situation,” said Ramgopal when asked if the early list indicated that party was expecting early elections.

The first list features four Yadav family members—the national president of the party Mulayam Singh, a sitting MP from Mainpuri, would contest the seat; Dharmendra Yadav would contest to retain his Badaun seat; Dimple Yadav would contest to retain her Kannauj seat while Akshya a new candidate would contest the Firozabad seat where Dimple had lost a by-poll to the Congress.

The party has not declared any candidate on Rae Bareily or Amethi seats. Sources had said that both Samajwadi Party and Congress would restore their earlier tradition of not fielding candidates in each other’s pocket borough. But Ramgopal in a reply to a question on Rae Bareily and Amethi said: “We have not declared candidates there as yet. There are 25 seats still left. And it won’t be right to make assumptions at this stage. It should also not be considered that some of the sitting MPs would be denied tickets.”

The party is bringing the Assembly speaker Mata Prasad Pandey into the Lok Sabha election fray. He has been declared candidate on Dumariyagang seat.

“In the assembly elections too we had declared candidates a year ahead of the polls and we repeated early declaration of candidates this time as well. Early announcements help a candidate to network well in his proposed constituency by optimizing resources,” said Ramgopal.

To pump up the youth cadre of the party, that was considered instrumental in the party’s thumping victory in the last Assembly elections, the national president of the Lohia Vahini, Anand Bhadauria has been declared candidate on Dhaurhara seat.

Asked to comment on the Congress national general secretary, Rahul Gandhi being appointed as the head of the Lok Sabha elections coordination committee of AICC, Ramgopal Yadav said: "One may deduce the fate by looking at his track record".